A Bath doctor has developed an app that allows patients with mental health issues to pay for quick access to online professional counselling.

GP trainee Julian Nesbitt developed the app after meeting patients who were close to breaking point because they couldn’t get the right help quickly enough on the NHS.

The 28-year-old decided there must be a better way and his research showed that virtual counselling was as effective as face-to-face therapy and psychiatry.

He said: “The NHS is trying it’s hardest to keep up with demand but people aren’t necessarily getting the help they need.

“While I was working in A&E, I found that a lot of people were at the end of their tether having self harmed or even tried to kill themselves because they hadn’t been able to get the right kind of help.”

Dr Nesbitt developed the app after speaking with desperate patients in A&E (Image: Artur Lesniak)

Although the NHS provides talking therapy for most patients with mental health issues, and recent government investment has improved the waiting times, it is still insufficient for most people, he said.

As well as the long waiting times, it does not provide enough sessions, and most of it is group-based which is not suitable for many mental health issues.

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The Dr Julian App, launched this month, allows patients to connect with a counsellor of their choice via video-link quickly and securely from home.

Counselling sessions with “high quality” mental health professionals cost from £45 per hour via the app, which works on iPhone or iPad.

Patients can have an online therapy session with a mental health professional of their choice via the app (Image: Artur Lesniak)

Dr Nesbitt said that he and Philippa Weitz, the app’s psychotherapy director, have personally recruited, interviewed and checked the credentials of a wide selection of “highly qualified and experienced therapists” whose performance they will also monitor.

Many of the therapists have different specialist interests such as gambling, addiction, trauma, relationship and psychosexual issues as well as stress, anxiety and depression.